Cost-saving measures adopted by School Board

SLIDELL — Strong business practices and fiscal responsibility by the St. Tammany Parish Public School System enabled the School Board to adopt cost-saving measures for taxpayers recently.
In the annual Fiscal Assessment Report issued by the Louisiana Department of Education, the School board received an excellent review of fiscal factors including excellent business practices, financial reporting and audit findings. The Board also received excellent marks for balanced budgets and maintaining fund balances.
“We appreciate the support of our community, and our School Board is dedicated to being fiscally responsible with taxpayer funds. Our history of rolling back millages and issuing refunding bonds when we are able to is a testament to our commitment to limiting the tax impact on residents while maintaining a safe and productive learning environment for our students,” said School Board President Stephen J. “Jack” Loup III on behalf of the School Board.
With the successful sale of refunding bonds from the 2008 bond renewal, the cost for taxpayers for voter approved upgrades to technology, enhanced school security, new school construction and extensive renovations to existing school facilities has been reduced by lower interest expense of $675,000 over the remainder of the bond term.
This is the eighth time in twelve years that the Board has refunded bonds in order to reduce taxes for local property owners. The savings to taxpayers for all refunding bonds issued during that time is estimated to be over $10.5 million.
Maintaining an AA bond rating issued by the Standard & Poor’s Rating Services, the School Board continues to save millions of dollars in interest costs on bonds. The savings in interest costs result in substantial savings to property taxpayers.
This is the highest bond rating issued to any School System in Louisiana.
Taxpayers will also see savings resulting from the Board voting to roll back the millage rate for ad valorem taxes for the 2016 tax roll.
The rollback of 1.77 mills saves approximately $3.4 million for St. Tammany Parish taxpayers this year.
Since 1990, the School Board has rolled back 21 mils, saving taxpayers an estimated $41 million for the 2016 tax roll at the current assessment level.
State law requires that millages be adjusted to a revenue-neutral level after every reassessment.
The rollback following the 2016 reassessment of property by the St. Tammany Parish Assessors Office is intended to maintain the same level of revenue collections regardless of the expected increase in property values.